Interpersonal Competence Across Domains: Relevance to Personality Pathology

Abstract

Interpersonal problems are significant markers of personality disorders (PDs). There is little research examining the specific interpersonal problems which lead to social impairment in PD. This study used canonical correlation analyses to examine the relationship between interpersonal competence and PDs, first as categorized by DSM-IV diagnoses, then as categorized by empirically-derived factors, in a sample at risk for recurrence of major depression. The most significant sources of shared variance were social inhibition and self-disclosure competence. The empirically-derived PD categories accounted for more variance in interpersonal competence than the DSM-IV diagnostic categories. Social skills training in initiation and self-disclosure may be useful for treating individuals with PD who experience interpersonal problems. Empirically-derived categories of PD symptoms may capture interpersonal problems experienced by individuals with PD which DSM-IV categories do not.

Personality Pathology Factors Predict Recurrent Major Depressive Disorder in Emerging Adults

“…The intraclass correlation (Case 1; Shrout & Fleiss, ) for the IPDE total dimensional score was 0.95. As previously reported (Muralidharan et al, ), the individual DSM‐IV personality disorder criteria assessed through this interview were factor analyzed, which yielded eight factors, labeled interpersonal hypersensitivity, antisocial conduct, unscrupulousness, social anxiety, identity disturbance, suspiciousness, misperception, and social avoidance.…”

“…In a prior investigation, a factor structure for DSM‐IV personality disorder symptoms was identified through exploratory factor analysis (Muralidharan, Sheets, Madsen, Craighead, & Craighead, ; Sheets, ). As expected, this factor structure did not directly correspond to the current DSM Axis II organization.…”

Interpersonal Competence and Daily Stress Generation in Individuals with Avoidant Personality Disorder Symptoms

“…As noted by Muralidharan, Sheets, Madsen, Craighead, and Craighead (2010), one potential reason for lack of specific information on interpersonal difficulties in personality disordered individuals may be due to an overreliance on global measures of interpersonal functioning. Previous research has often focused on a few interpersonal behaviors, rather than applying theories of interpersonal competence.…”

10. The composition of competence: Communication skills

“…Shor, Roelfs, and Yogev (2013) meta-analyzed 50 studies representing over 100,000 persons, finding that, controlling for covariates, "lower levels of emotional support are associated with an 11 % higher risk of mortality" (p. 631). Social skills are also strongly implicated in the development of learning disabilities (Forness and Kavale 1996), personality disorders (Muralidharan et al 2011), crime (Smångs 2010) and academic success (Durlak, Weissberg, and Pachan 2010;Reed and Spicer 2003;cf., Duncan et al 2007). "Greater marital quality was related to better health, with mean effects sizes from r = .07 to .21, including lower risk of mortality (r = .11) and lower cardiovascular reactivity during marital conflict (r = -.13)" (Robles et al 2014, p. 140).…”